Sometimes the Friday news drop is good

 I was away last week, so this is coming Monday morning, when you have no doubt already heard: the federal grants that should have come through for the start of the fiscal year on July 1 are being released today. Below is the email that went out on Friday at 2:41 PM: 

You should note that this comes from our old friend "no reply @"
States used to get emails from actual identified people.

While they're continuing the bluster over adhering to federal regulations by which they mean "the discriminatory way we're interpreting these regulations," that isn't new; this is the nonsense we went through at the beginning of the year for which Massachusetts' answer is here.

While the funds are being released prior to school starting across the country, in many districts, damage has already been done. For example, the Globe reports: 

Some programs saw an immediate, negative impact following the freeze, including the Migrant Education Program, which provides additional education to the children of migratory farm and fishery workers whose jobs require families to move across the state and country due to seasonal employment.

The program, which has operated in Massachusetts since 1966, aims to address the toll on children’s education caused by the frequent moves, as students transfer between different school districts or miss school altogether to work alongside their parents.

In Springfield, 9-year-old Ery Perez Gutierrez last summer focused on sharpening his academic skills at Boland Elementary School. This summer, Ery, a US-born citizen whose Guatemalan mother previously worked in tobacco fields across three states, won’t get the chance to learn science lessons or meet new friends.

Ery is among hundreds of children in Massachusetts spending the summer at home because of the funding freeze.

 
EdWeek, which has been following this closely, has a useful look at what this means and where we are. It is of note that these are grants which Trump has proposed eliminating for next year. Politico also reported that the administration was preparing a proposal for Congress to claw back education funds, and it is unclear which ones that would be. As Mark Lieberman sums up in EdWeek: 

The Trump administration has thrown federal education funding into chaos since Jan. 20—yanking already-awarded grant funds; changing spending rules and guidelines without warning; asking Congress to consider massive cuts.